CHAPTER XXXVI.

ABOUT HELLIFIELD.

Malham to Hellifield-Domesday record-Meaning of Hellifield-The IngsAnciently an arm of the sea-Discovery of whale bones-History of the manor -Hamerton family-Hellifield Peel-Swinden-Disused coach-road-Old corn-mill-Walk to Gargrave.

ROM Malham we will return to Otterburn, whence it is but a short walk of 2 miles by the large prehistoric grave-mound or barrow, previously described, to Hellifield.

Hellifield, says Dr. Whitaker, is the field of Helgh, its Saxon owner. But the Saxons, as appears in Domesday, called it Helgefelt, or Helgeflet:

MANOR. In Rodemare (Rathmell) Carl had two carucates to be taxed. In Winchelesuurde (Wigglesworth) ten oxgangs. In Helgeflet (Hellifield) two carucates and a half.

Such is the record in that ancient testimony. Hel, Helge, and Helig, have the meaning, in the language of the ancient Teutons, of holy, as in Heligoland, i.e. the holy isle,-German heilig. This may, therefore, be the holy field, or if we are to interpret the last portion of the word as flet, Teut. fleot,- —a flush of water, or arm of the sea on which vessels may float, as in Fleetwood,† we may assume it to mean the site of the holy or sacred marsh, stream, or estuary. The low, flat lands that expand hence to the Wigglesworth and Long Preston Ings, around the Ribble

* But if this be objected to, perhaps we can discover an interpretation in the Saxon Halgh, Scottish Haugh or Heugh, a flat, spungy piece of ground between hills or on the banks of a stream. But in England, haugh or how, as Miss Blackie observes, come more frequently from the Scand. haugr, a heap or mound often raised over a grave, like the cairns in Scotland. Whitaker, in his History of Whalley (1818), p. 36, gives three instances in which it is compounded with personal names, as Dunkenhalgh, Pouthalgh, Hesmondhalgh, and three others in which the local word united with it plainly indicates its meaning, as Aspenhalgh, the halgh (or mire) of aspens, Ridyhalgh, the halgh of reeds, and Beckshalgh, the halgh by the brooks, the last immediately north of the Ribble, which accounts for its combination with Beck.

† See Blackie's Place Names, p. 81.

and adjacent tributary becks, have no doubt at one time been wholly covered with water, and even yet, on occasions of but moderate floods, passengers on the railway may perceive a succession of large, shallow meres, with cattle beside them splashing in the wet meads, and extending over the wide bottoms for a good square mile below Hellifield station. After continued rains these spreads of water have the appearance of permanent lakes, and often attract numbers of sea-birds. It is, therefore, likely, as the old Domesday name suggests, that this was a permanent flush or fleet, before the land was drained, and in very remote times, an elbow or arm of the sea.*

The old history of Hellifield is in the main the history of the Hamertons, of Hellifield Peel. The earliest mention of the family occurs in the 26th Henry II. (A.D. 1170), when a Richard de Hamerton paid a fine of half a mark. The manor was originally held by its mesne lords, the De Knolls, of the knights of St. John of Jerusalem, but about the end of the reign of Edward III., a matrimonial alliance having been formed between the heiress of Elias de Knolle and Adam, son of John de Hamerton, the manors of Knolsmere, Wigglesworth, and Hellifield Peel, descended to this family. Lawrence Hamerton, of Hamerton, son of Richard, son of the above Adam, obtained in the 19th Henry VI. (1440-1) royal licence to fortify and embattle his manor of Hellifield, and in consequence of this specific grant he erected the strong, sturdy and compact building known as Hellifield Peel. This Lawrence Hamerton, who is buried in the south choir of Long Preston Church, married a daughter of Sir John Tempest, of Bracewell, Kt., by Alice, daughter of Richard Sherburn, of Stonyhurst, Esq., and left a numerous family. His eldest son was Sir Richard Hamerton, who married Elizabeth, daughter of Sir John Assheton, of Assheton-under-Lyne, Knight of the Bath at the coronation of Henry IV. He died in 1480, leaving his son, Sir Stephen Hamerton, heir to a vast property.

Sir Stephen married a daughter of Sir William Plumpton, of the old family of Plumpton, near Knaresborough, whose son, John Hamerton,

* Since the above was written I have received an important communication from the Rev. W. S. Sykes, of Sheffield, formerly of Rathmell, in apparent confirmation of this. He tells me that about 30 years ago a perfect vertebræ of a whale (now in his possession) was taken out of the river gravel in the valley bottom, about a mile to the west of Hellifield. A man named Luke Bullock, who was at that time gamekeeper in Rathmell, saw the bone dug out with fragments of many others, while some draining was going on in Wigglesworth Ings. The bone measures 18 inches long, 114 inches deep, and is 24 inches across the spinal hollow, where it is 4 inches thick. Its weight is 4 lbs. 15 oz As there appears to have been a group of bones found together, it is very probable that the animal was washed up by sea-tides when the Ings was an estuary. The spot is in the Ribble basin, and is now over 20 miles from the Ribble estuary.

of Hamerton and Wigglesworth, Esq.,* married a daughter of Sir Geoffrey Middleton, of Middleton Hall, co. Westmoreland, elsewhere mentioned. This John Hamerton, as appears by an Inquisition p.m., taken at Ilkley, April 14th, 1516, was found to have been seized in demesne, as of fee, of the manors of Hamerton, Knolsmere, Wigglesworth, Hellifield, and Langfield, and of the third part of Rishworth, &c., besides lands in Slaidburn, Newton, Settle, Pheser, Calton, and Coniston-Cold. He was father of the celebrated but unfortunate Sir Stephen Hamerton, Kt., who, attainted with many others of high treason through allying himself with the disastrous Pilgrimage of Grace, was "drawn, hanged, and quartered at Tyburn, and the whole of his estates were in consequence forfeited to the Crown, 28th Henry VIII. (A.D. 1537).†

Hellifield, as it happened, was preserved by a settlement for the life of the widow of John Hamerton, who was the mother of Sir Stephen. Subsequently, 7th Edward VI., the manor passed, by licence, to Sir Arthur Darcy, Kt., the grantee of Sallay Abbey, and who already owned large estates in Craven. He, again, suffered an alienation of the manor (2nd and 3rd of Philip and Mary) to John Redman, Esq., father of Francis, who had married Margaret, daughter and co-heir of Henry, son of the attainted Sir Stephen Hamerton, and by fine levied at Westminster, 3rd Elizabeth, (1561), the said John and Francis, and Margaret, wife of Francis, in conjunction with Anthony Watson, Thomas Watson, and Alice, his wife, passed the manor to John Hamerton, Esq., son of Richard, younger brother of Sir Stephen, by which arrangement it returned once more to the Hamerton family, and to whom it still belongs.

Hellifield Peel, now the seat of Frank J. Bright, Esq., a nephew of the late eminent politician Mr. John Bright, occupies a verdant and level mead, about half-a-mile to the south of the village. Erected just five and a half centuries ago, it is probably, with the single exception of Bolton Hall, the oldest entire mansion now remaining in Craven. The building is in form quadrilateral, and has been protected by a deep and broad moat, which is still perfect. There are three stories, with embattled parapets, and walls of great thickness, and doubtless from the plainness of the structure, its great strength, and comparatively * He died September 20th, 1515. For a copy of his will, dated 1513, see Vol. lxxix, page 45, of the Surtees Society's Publications.

See Surtees Society's Publications, Vol. 42, page 273.

See Whitaker's Craven, 3rd ed., p. 118; Yorkshire Record Series, Vol. iii. p. 112. For Pedigrees of the family of Hamerton down to 1870, see Foster's, Yorkshire Pedigrees, Vol. i., (1874); Whitaker's Craven, 3rd ed., p. 150; also Dugdale's Visitation of Yorkshire, by Surtees Society, Vol. xxxvi., p. 354. For Index to Hamerton Wills and Administrations on record in the P P. C., Somerset House, London, see Turner's Yorkshire Genealogist, Vol. i. (1888), pp. 84-6.

small size, it was intended for use only as a fortified retreat in disturbed times. The original owners up to the attainder of Sir Stephen Hamerton, in 1537, lived in great splendour at the neighbouring Wigglesworth Hall. The mansion, however, has since undergone some restoration and improvement, and though still retaining its ancient features, has now more of the appearance of a retired country seat, than of an old war-proof stronghold or barrack-house as it must have been. Pleasant gardens and luxuriant foliage brighten the surroundings, and there are all the usual modern outbuildings &c., that belong to a large private residence.

On one of these,-the gardener's house,-there is built into the front an ancient well-cut stone, bearing a portion of a Latin inscription, and also another stone having the initials and date D. I. A., 1694, which are said to have come from an old house at Swinden, pulled down six years ago. Another stone with a defaced inscription, brought from Sallay Abbey, is built into the servants' hall, or new end of the house. On the south lawn there are two large stones inscribed with the arms of Hamerton (three hammers), also from Sallay Abbey. Near them is an old sun-dial, and another stone which, it is supposed, once supported an astronomical telescope. A few years ago, when the house was being repaired, an ancient walled-round well was discovered beneath the flags of what is now used as a coal-cellar. It was probably the chief source of water supply to the inmates in a time of siege. It is said that during several occasions of war and panic, the old Peel has been hung round with wool-packs, as a protection against shells.

A pleasant walk by Hellifield Peel to Gargrave may be had by way of Swinden, above mentioned, and Bank Newton. The distance is about 7 miles. You follow the Gisburn road from Hellifield, about mile, to Pan Beck farm, opposite which, on the left, an old road runs up over Goose Mere Height, and by a thorn hedge through the fields to Swinden. This was the old coach-road from Clitheroe and Gisburn to Hellifield and the north, which joined the present highway near the Pan Beck farm-house, but it is now open field, and one can hardly believe, from present appearances, that it has been traversed by ponderous coaches in the old days. The Leeds and Kendal coaches also passed through the village at the same time, where they pulled up at the Black Horse. This inn, by the way, which has lately been rebuilt, is an old and increasingly valuable property of the Gargrave Charity Trust.

Just below the Pan Beck Barn a small bridge crosses the stream, near which, and close under the plantation, stood the ancient Hellifield corn-mill, but not a vestige of it has been seen these sixty years. The Canons of Bolton had the mill at one time, with the tithe of corn. They had also the tithe of corn at Wigglesworth.'

* See Burton's Monasticon, pp. 117 and 120.

*

The walk hence through the "deserted village" of Swinden, and by way of Bank Newton to Gargrave, is very pleasant. In the genial days of summer, when the luxuriant hedgerows dismantle themselves of their scented May-dress, and

66

Jolly June array'd

All in green leaves, as he a Player were,

steps lightly in, the ground is a perfect nosegay. Bonny wild roses, tiptoe upon hawthorn stocks," fling their delicate fragrance from the swelling hedge-banks, where the tall vetches, pink valerian, and creamy crowns of sweet cicely beneath, disport themselves in delightful contrast with the fragile-leaved blossoms of the purple cranes-bill and spikes of golden agrimony. The air is redolent of many sweets, while bloom and beauty are everywhere.